Layouts

Title

Post

I'm new to FMPro, but am getting more knowledgable as each day passes.

I wish to create a "Master Dashboard" for the database I am designing. This dashboard is the 1st screen the users will see when they load the database.

I want it to look simular to the pre-designed tabbed view like the starter solution "email Campaign" or with a set of menu buttons at the top of the design very much like the button design of a web page. Like the menu you see hosting my site

www.swdm.co.uk.

If I can get it to look as close the the above url then I'll be happy as larry. image attached.

any advice just to get the initial design layout done would be great.

I am following the FMPro Adv essentials training on lynda.com which has been great.

You should be able to use the TAB control to make the tabbed view for your dashboard easily. Simply select the tab creation tool from the tool pallete and then draw a square over the area where you want the tabbed pane. This will then give you a window to create and name each tab, decide the width of the tabs, and color of the pane. You can even decide which tab the window opens to automatically.

I have a little trick I use to add a dashboard type menu to solutions when I have limited space to work with if you would like to see a sample I would be ahppy to share it with you.

This method takes a little more work, makes your solution a little more top-heavy...but the effect is awesome. My clients love the hidden menu built into their solutions. It enables you to use all the screen real estate you need and still offer a ready to use menu for full navigation at anytime.

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Going to make a sample with a tabbed top across just like you have on your site now for you to see....uploading it in a couple minutes.

Were on the right tracks. Dashboard is a great idea and one I thought about.

So if we have the dashboard as in your download and then some menu buttons along the top that will load specific tables into the dash board with a tabbed menu that is more along the lines of my thinking. The initial dashboard will need to be empty as I would like to just populate it with some text explaining the steps for users to initially use the db.

A good example I suppose is similar to the free app on www.fmstartingpoint.com. interns of the buttons and tabbed layout.

I am curisous as to how you managed to create a layout without any tables. When I tried that it wanted tables associated with the layout.

One way to "fool" FM is to create a table of Global Fields and use that as your layouts table. This can be as small as a single field (ie userid) then create relationships to this table and you can add portals and related fields to your layout from various tables.

You can use the cartesian join so that this global table is related to every record in the data tables. (I wouldnt use it necessarily Id just set the appropriate key fields to the tables I wanted as seperate global fields in this main table.)

You can go nuts (as in overboard) with this approach but it has some very distinct advantages of being able to display disparate data on the same layout.

PS - Don't be too impressed by FM Starting Point...excellent work but way WAY more complicated than it needs to be for the end user. It is mostly designed as a sort of "See what all you can do with FMP" type of solution really.

PS2 - And it is possible to make things look EXACTLY like your web image above with a little photoshop skills to go along with your FMP skills. ;) OR even easier just use the exact same graphic buttons you use on your web site if you like.

NOTE: For anyone keeping up with this thread, you can download the samples I have links to here and I will end the thread with an illustration/text/sample of the fix for the issue to assist anyone in the future.